Louise Abbotts, spokeswoman for inStreatham, defended the installation of the tree, saying it makes a "real impact" at night.

She told the Standard: "After a few years of disappointing real trees in Streatham the InStreatham BID Board, made up of local business owners, landowners and residents decided that this year we would try something new and opted for light filled cone trees to see what the impact and feedback would be.

"We have also explored the idea of living trees and better dressed real trees so we invite people to get in touch and let us know their thoughts, both good and bad.

"This year we have invested in new Christmas Lights for the lamp columns, have installed festoon lighting and lights in trees around the area of the new weekly Saturday Market and we are trialling the four new trees on Streatham Hill, Streatham Green, Streatham Common and Streatham Vale."

She added: "Personally as resident myself I feel that whilst they don’t look like very impressive by day they make a real impact at night especially the 8m tree on the common which can be seen for miles."